Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of the level of leukaemia cases diagnosed in an emergency setting on (a) patient outcomes and (b) NHS resources.

We recognise the importance of earlier diagnosis of cancer to survival, and we know that patients with cancer who are diagnosed via an emergency route are most likely to have poor survival. Whilst a specific assessment on leukaemia has not been made, we are determined to take all the necessary steps to improve early diagnosis for all cancers, including blood cancers such as leukaemia. To accomplish this, the National Health Service is implementing non-specific symptom pathways for patients who present with symptoms such as weight loss and fatigue, which do not clearly align to a tumour type. Blood cancers are one of the most common cancer types diagnosed through these pathways.